Network scaling refers to a communication network's ability to provide adequate data throughput to all user devices connected to this network even as user population of the network increases. Providing network scaling for wireless networks can be particularly difficult due to the necessity of sharing a common resource, namely available radio frequency spectrum, generally referred to as radio frequency (RF) bandwidth. Inefficient over-crowding of RF bandwidth among users can, for example, cause excessive mutual interference that degrades the performance of the network. Cellular radio systems have circumvented the scaling problem by geographically dispersing the RF bandwidth used (e.g., frequency re-use among different cells) and by cell splitting (e.g., reduction in the number of users per area sharing the bandwidth). In addition, cellular networks can mitigate the need for scaling by using wireless communication as a final reach (last mile) to users while the network core relies on copper wire, fiber and point-to-point microwave links for backhaul data transport. Such solutions are generally not applicable to mobile ad hoc networks and communications that require direct fast message exchange such as may be useful both commercially and militarily, for example, within a swarm of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), automobile-to-automobile or autonomous vehicle networks, sensor networks, robot networks, smart airborne munitions, or soldier-to-soldier networks in a tactical battlefield environment.
Accordingly, there exists a need in the art for scalable and robust communication over very large networks that solves problems of frequency and bandwidth resource sharing among wireless communication devices.